New York, NY, March 28, 2012—Legal Services NYC today applauded Governor Andrew Cuomo, Attorney General Eric Schneiderman, and the New York State Legislature for their successful efforts to restore funding for the statewide Foreclosure Prevention Services Program in the FY 2012-13 budget. Up to $9 million of the funds used to support the extension of services will come from the $132 million secured by the Attorney General in the recent mortgage servicing settlement. Funding for the program was to have expired on April 1st, leaving programs across the state at risk of having to shut their doors to the thousands of New York homeowners currently facing or at serious risk of foreclosure.

March 23, 2012, Bronx, NY —Today, Bronx Borough President Ruben Diaz Jr. and State Senator Ruth Hassell-Thompson joined other officials and community leaders to announce a major new development which will be the new home of Legal Services NYC-Bronx. Legal Services NYC-Bronx will soon open their new ADA-accessible home at the Hub on E.149th and Brook Avenue. The new office will be a dignified community space and safe-haven where all clients can access free civil legal services in confidence and comfort.  The facility includes a new green space and provides the accessibility and service capacity that clients deserve. (Photo: Borough President  Diaz and Senator Hassell-Thompson with Legal Services NYC-Bronx staff)

March 1, 2012, Brooklyn, NY— Tenants and advocates from Families United for Racial & Economic Equality (FUREE) gathered today in front of Brooklyn Housing Court to demand that NYCHA stop forcing residents to live in dangerous and unhealthy conditions, stop misusing capital repair funds for other programs, enhance its Centralized Calling Center (CCC) to prioritize backlogged repair tickets and make repairs in a timely manner, and to use Section 3 funding to train and hire unemployed residents to make repairs. Following the event, attorneys from South Brooklyn Legal Services (a program of Legal Services NYC) filed a group lawsuit against NYCHA to force repairs for tenants of three Brooklyn NYCHA properties. 

February 9, 2012—Legal Services NYC today praised Attorney General Schneiderman's advocacy on behalf of New York’s homeowners and his efforts to strengthen the national settlement with mortgage servicers, and we look forward to learning more details about the settlement, with the hope that this settlement is enforced with more vigor than some previously-heralded settlements whose impacts have been disappointing. We are especially relieved to learn that the Attorney General’s lawsuit against several major servicers and Mortgage Electronic Registration Systems (MERS) was not withdrawn as the banks had demanded, as there is still much more work to do to address unfair and deceptive foreclosure practices in New York.